


Seventy-six trombones led the big parade

by EponineTheStrange (gallifreyandglowclouds)



Category: Doctor Who RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-07
Updated: 2013-06-07
Packaged: 2017-12-14 04:41:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/832859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallifreyandglowclouds/pseuds/EponineTheStrange
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Smillan high school AU. They're in the marching band together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Seventy-six trombones led the big parade

To say that he lacks musical talent is something of an understatement. 

He digs the clarinet out of his closet on the day of the marching band audition, because suddenly football’s out of the running because of his back and stuff, and his mom insists that he has to do  _something_ because universities like seeing that people are involved in extra-curricular activities, and the marching band is the last possible thing that he can do. 

He eighty-five percent remembers how to play, and the only practice he does before the audition is to make sure that his clarinet, cast in the deepest, darkest recesses of his closet since the end of the ninth grade, actually still works. 

It does. Wonderful.

* * *

When he appears at school with his clarinet case, he runs in to one of his friend Mark from the football team, who gives him a shocked look. 

“Matthew Smith,” he says, and Matt can’t help but feel a small twinge of jealousy at the helmet he’s got tucked under his arm because all he wants to do is play football, “please tell me that is not an instrument case that you’re carrying there.” 

Matt shrugs and looks around to see if anyone else is watching. “Yeah, it is. Now that I’m off the team, my mom says I need something to do. So I’m going to give the marching band a try.” 

Mark laughs so hard that he almost falls over. “Please tell me you’re joking.” 

Matt shakes his head.

“Well, bro, I bet you’ll look great in epaulettes.” 

Right. The uniform does include epaulettes, doesn’t it? 

* * *

Auditions are after school, which kind of sucks because it allows the news that he, Matthew Smith, former running back of the football team, was going to up and join the marching band. People started giving him funny looks before lunch. 

He literally does not understand how that information would spread so quickly. 

After the bell rings, he leaves biology without a second thought, grabs his clarinet from his locker, and makes his way down to the band room, which for some reason is in the scariest corner of the basement of the school. 

There isn’t a huge line of people auditioning, because their school marching band is small and based around a core group of people who just do it year in and year out. 

He knows from pep rallies and stuff that people give the marching band a bit of a hard time. He doesn’t really know if it’s deserved or not, but he goes along with it. Peer pressure. He’ll just blame that. 

He’s the last of several to audition, and he recognises the girl that goes before him as Karen. They had English together junior year, but really haven’t interacted that much since then. She’s cute, though, because the summer between sophomore year and junior year she disappeared and just blossomed. She’s got this wonderful bright orange hair and legs that go on for miles and miles. 

She’s a bit clumsy, though. She almost gives him a head injury with her trombone case when she gets up to go for her audition. 

Matt’s accepted, but barely. He knows this because when he finishes playing the piece they had him sightread, the conductor sighs, purses his lips, and says, “You are incredibly lucky that our third clarinet has graduated.” 

* * *

The rehearsal schedule is actually more demanding than his football practice schedule, which really surprises him.

Their first practice is all about marching in sync. Matt though that sports would give him some kind of coordination, but he actually falls over once. 

Homecoming, which is their first performance, is in six weeks. They get the sheet music at the end of the rehearsal, which they have to practice and memorise before the concert. 

“Shit,” Matt says, looking at it. He could barely get his fingers around the audition piece, and now he has to deal with this? 

His co-third clarinet, Joseph, comes up behind him and taps him on the shoulder. 

“I c-c-c-can help y-y-you with that,” he says. “We c-c-could p-p-practice together.”

Matt nods politely. “Thanks, bud.”There’s a note of condescension in his voice that he’s not too proud of. He turns away from him and walks away. 

Later as he’s collecting his things from his locker and getting ready to go home, Karen comes up to him. 

“You could try and make friends with him, you know,” she says, leaning against the locker beside his.

“Who?” Matt asks. 

“Joseph. Outside of band, he literally has no one. So I’d appreciate if you wouldn’t brush him off. Your music-reading skills could probably use some work, based on what I heard of your audition yesterday.” She raises an eyebrow at him, daring him to respond. 

“Hey,” he says, “do you enjoy being an asshole to me?”

“Asshole?” she says, a little affronted. “I’m being honest.”  

“Right, so this has nothing to do with the fact that you’re weirded out about the fact that some jock has suddenly switched sides and joined the marching band?” 

She shakes her head. “I think this is actually going to harder for you than you think.” 

* * *

She’s right.

People literally fucking  _unfriend him_ on Facebook, which is kind of unheard of unless you’ve actually done something to hurt them. People stop saying hello to him in the hall. The stereotype of the American football player having all of the friends in high school exists for a reason. 

He has lost all of his social capital now that he’s actually going ahead with the whole marching band thing. 

It’s fun, though. He doesn’t want to quit, even though high school is getting closer and closer to hell. 

He finds Joseph one day after struggling through the sheet music for their performance. They have three weeks to go before homecoming. 

“Hey, Joe,” Matt says, “you have a prep period after lunch, right?” 

He nods, and he’s kind of beaming. 

“Do you want to go over the music then?” 

He nods again. “L-l-let’s meet in the b-b-band room at t-t-the end of l-l-lunch.” 

Matt nods, and gives him a thumbs up. 

What Matt doesn’t notice is that some of his former football buddies have followed him, and as he makes his way towards English they come up behind him and push him over, and all of his books go flying everywhere. 

“What the fuck, man -” he says, but they’ve walked away laughing so he doesn’t really get a chance to respond. He dusts off his shirt, and then tries to see where all of his books have flown to courtesy of linoleum, but finds that Karen’s already picked them all up for him and is standing there in front of him with them in her extended arms. 

“Thanks,” he says, grabbing them from her. He’s furious, and his ears are burning, and he storms off, but she matches him step for step. 

“What, can’t get any band geek on you?” 

He gives her a scathing look. “Joseph and I are practicing in the band room after lunch if you’d like to join us, seeing as we both have a prep period then.”

“Congratulations, you’ve proved yourself to be less of an asshole than I previously thought you were. I’m going to have to decline, because I’ve got AP chemistry then, but I appreciate the offer.” 

Now she’s just making him angry. He stops abruptly, and turns to face her. “You know, you’re being just as mean to me about being a jock as those guys are about being in the band.” 

“Yeah?” she says. “When’s the last time you saw the marching band push someone over in the middle of the hallway?”

He has no adequate response to that. 

“Listen, they’re going to be assholes, and no amount of fighting is going to change that. My suggestion to you is to just stop caring what people think. That’ll make it a lot easier.” 

She walks away from him. 

* * *

She’s kind of right, which kills him a little bit to admit. When a couple of guys from the team walk by his locker and refer to him as a faggot, he just waves back politely and carries on with his life. 

The bullying doesn’t stop, necessarily, but he just finds better ways to deal with it. 

He and Joseph practice like maniacs when they can get the chance, and by the time their performance at Homecoming rolls around, Matt is reasonably confident that he’s got the music memorised and that he isn’t going to trip. 

Karen starts to join them during lunch and during the one time that the three of them share a prep period. She’s an excellent trombonist, but a bit vicious with the slide when Matt or Joseph make a mistake. 

* * *

Homecoming is a success.

They march in sync. They turn in sync. No one forgets the music. And Karen even says that Matt looks excellent in epaulettes and a top hat. 

Most of the band doesn’t stay for the football game afterwards, but Karen and Matt do, and he chalks up the fact that she’s been pressing herself in to his side for the whole game to the fact that it's kind of cold outside. It’s pleasant, though. He’s not going to ask her to stop. 

Joseph’s mom has everyone in the band over for what might be the tamest party that Matt’s ever been to. There’s non-alcoholic punch, the most adorable little canapes, and swing music playing that makes Matt sort of tap his heels. 

He leans against the kitchen counter watching Joseph try and woo the snare drum player. He seems to be rather in to it. Karen comes and stands beside Matt. 

“It’s amazing watching true love blossom, eh?” she says. 

Matt nods. “He’s been asking me about trying to pick up girls. To be honest, I don’t have a ton of experience with it but I tried to help him out as best I could. I mean, I didn’t really know that it was going to be used on Leonard, but hey, whatever floats his boat.” 

“He’s barely even stuttering.” 

“What can I say, Karen?” Matt says with a wry smile. “They grow up so fast.” 

* * *

Things all go rather swimmingly in to November, though the weather gets cold and awful and they have to practice in the gym instead of outside on the playing field. Karen starts to find small, seemingly purposeless reasons to hang out with Matt, and he swears that she’s got to be skipping chemistry because she’s going to more and more of his and Joseph’s practice sessions. 

“I dropped it,” she says by way of explanation. “It turns out I don’t need it for the university program that I want to get in to.” 

Midway through the month, Matt manages to get his stuff sorted out for university, and as he leaves the guidance counsellor’s office, he turns a corner and finds some guys from the football team hassling Joseph and Leonard. 

For a moment he is paralysed, because he usually just tried to stay away from situations like this. But something impels him forward, and before he one-hundred percent realises what he’s getting in to, he’s marched himself up to Mark, who gives him an angry look. 

“Move along, Smith,” he says, “there’s no trouble here.” 

“Really?” Matt says. “That’s not what it looks like. It actually looks like you were giving these two gentlemen a hard time.” 

“Yeah?” Mark says. “And what’s that to you?” 

“Well, they’re my friends,” Matt says, and shoots a quick smile Joseph’s way. “And I don’t really want anyone to be giving them a hard time.” 

“Oh, so you’re friends with the little marching-band faggots now? I expected better of you, Matt.” 

Matt shrugs. “Well, everyone else seems to have ditched me, but the marching band seems to be a rather accepting bunch. Certainly they’re a lot nicer than the assholes I used to hang out with.”

“You calling me an asshole?” Mark has this vein in his head that bulges whenever he gets angry. It’s bulging a lot now. 

“Perhaps.” 

There’s a really, really pregnant pause, and then Mark winds up to punch Matt, and then instinct just kicks in and it degenerates in to a massive fight. 

* * *

Matt and Mark both end up with two-week suspensions, despite the fact that Mark started it and laid a far more significant bruising on Matt than he did on Mark. (The dude’s twice his size. That was a fight he just shouldn’t have ever picked.) 

He ends up at home with his ego, his face, and body severely bruised. He lies in bed, staring at the ceiling, and at about eight o’clock in the evening, he hears a knock on the door. 

“Matt!” His mother yells. “The door’s for you!” 

Who the hell would that be? 

He comes down the stairs and oh, there’s Karen. It looks like she’s been walking in the freezing rain/sleet that’s been coming down all day. 

“Hey,” he says. “Come in.” 

She does wordlessly, and takes off her wet stuff, which Matt puts on the radiator to dry. 

“Joseph got your homework for you,” Karen says, and hands him a plastic bag full of papers. 

“He didn’t have to do that.” 

“No, he actually kind of did,” Karen says. “He says thank you. I understand that what you did was brave but stupid.” 

Matt rolls his eyes. “Probably.” 

“You going to let me in, or are we going to talk here for the rest of the night?” 

“Right,” Matt says, and leads her in to the kitchen. “Can I get you anything?” 

“Got any tea?” 

“Earl Grey,” he says. “My dad’s a Brit, so yeah, we’ve got tea.” 

“I’d love some of that.” 

He puts the kettle on, and also gets down some of the Jaffa cakes that his grandmother brought from England when she came to visit in the summer. He offers her some, and she takes one. 

“I like these. Never had them before.” 

“Can’t usually get them over here,” Matt says. “My gran brings them when she comes over. They’re my favourite.” 

He pours her some tea, and mixes himself some hot cocoa, and then they go and sit in the living room. 

* * *

She comes over most of the days during his suspension under the pretence of bringing his homework to him. Some days they do work, and other days they play video games, board games, or watch TV. She introduces him to Miyazaki, and it turns out he likes anime more than he thought he would. 

There are days where she can’t come, though, and it turns out that he misses it a lot. 

His dad pokes his head in one evening when Karen doesn’t come to visit. “Is our friend Ginger coming over this evening?”

Matt shakes his head. 

“Gee, I thought you guys were dating.” 

Matt looks up at his father in shock. “I didn’t think we were.” 

“You had her arm around her while you guys were watching cartoons last night.” 

He did, didn’t he? He just likes how she feels pressed in to his side, and how soft her hair felt when she would lean her head on his shoulder. Shit, he might want to date her. 

“Just let me know when you two figure things out,” his dad says. “Your mother and I like her a lot.” 

Matt blushes scarlet at that one. 

* * *

There’s a Christmas dance before exams start, and Matt’s not one hundred percent sure if he’s going to go or not. 

“Come on,” Karen says over the phone about a week before the dance. “I’m sure you own a bow tie or something and a suit. You can look perfectly dashing and have a good time.” 

“I’m going to get my ass kicked by the football team.”

“They’ll be too busy making out with their Barbie-doll girlfriends to worry about you. You’re going. I leave you no choice.”  

* * *

So he does go. He borrows a red-silk bow tie from his dad, and his mom tears up a little when she sees him before he goes off to school. 

He awkwardly mills around the half-empty gym. He did get there a little early, but Leonard and Joseph show up and he talks to them for a while. 

More people arrive, and Matt’s starting to get a little miffed at Karen because she said she was going, and has not yet arrived. 

But then she appears, and she’s wearing this wonderful magenta silk dress belted at the waist with a brown belt, and Matt’s mouth goes a little bit dry. 

“Hey,” he says, as she approaches him, “you… you look awesome.” His brain is sort of on the fritz at the moment. 

She smiles at him, kind of shyly, and he didn’t know that she had that in her. “You’re rather dapper yourself.” 

He gets her some punch, and they stand against the wall, watching people dance for a while, and not talking. There’s something new and weird between them, and he’s not really sure what to do with it. He slips an arm around her waist, and she kind of sighs or something, he can’t really hear. But she doesn’t move away. 

“Do you want to dance?” Matt asks. 

“I dance like an awkward white person, but okay,” she says, and grabs his hand and leads him to the dance floor. 

She does dance like an awkward white person, but so does he, so it’s fine.  _Iris_ by the Goo Goo Dolls starts to play, and well, it’s time for a slow dance. 

Neither of them can properly waltz, so he wraps his arms around waist and she drapes hers over his shoulders. 

Neither of them look right at each other, because this is intimate and close and nothing like what they’ve ever done before. He wonders though, with all of those evenings spent together, were they heading here to begin with?

He thinks about kissing her, and he wants to, but he sort of feels like here is not the appropriate place. 

“Do you want to go home?” He asks her. 

She nods, and grab their coats from the coat check and leave the dance. 

They walk home, and about a block or two away from school she gently wraps her hand in his. They’re both wearing gloves, but he can feel the heat of her hand against his, and he kind of loves it. 

They arrive at her house first, and she invites him in. 

“Cocoa?” She asks as he takes his coat and gloves off. 

He nods, and she goes in to her kitchen and puts the kettle on. He walks in to the kitchen as well, and she’s leaning against the counter, and he walks up to her and because it seems like a logical thing to do, he kisses her. 

She smells like sweet perfume, and tastes like Earl Grey, which has been her drink of choice since she started coming to see him. He slips his hands around her waist and can feel her warmth through the smooth silk of her dress. Her hands wrap around his neck and pulls him closer to her, and there’s not really that big of a height difference but because she’s pulling him so tight she bends back against the counter and he sort of towers over her. 

They break apart sort of suddenly because he needs to breathe, but they don’t really move away from each other, they just stand there with their arms around each other, and then Karen starts to laugh and so does Matt because everything was ridiculous and intense and now it’s kind of not. 

“Ummm, so…” Matt starts. 

“That just happened,” she says.

He nods. 

“I’d be okay if that happened again,” she says. 

It’s a damn good thing that Karen has an electric kettle where the lid doesn’t blow off when the water boils, because when the water does finish boiling, they’re a little busy. 

* * *

He buys her Jaffa cakes for Christmas, and by the time band strikes up again they’re a pretty well-established couple. 

She still whacks him with her trombone slide when he’s being stupid, though.


End file.
